Comments on: The origin of geourl and finding MeFi members near you

The origin of geourl and finding MeFi members near you

mathowie — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 13:07:19 -0800

I really like geourl and wanted to know which metafilter members lived near me, so I programmed it today. If you're logged in, and viewing a member's page that has a zip code, it'll do a lookup for all the other members within a 1/2 degree of longitude/latitude which is about 25 miles. Scroll down on my user page to see everyone near me.

By: thirteen

thirteen — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 13:11:34 -0800

Damn! You live near everybody!

By: thirteen

thirteen — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 13:13:04 -0800

Damn! So do I!

By: mathowie

mathowie — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 13:14:45 -0800

Chicago, nyc, and SF have a zillion matches. Those in the flyover zones may notice just a few neighbors. Remember the map?

By: Ufez Jones

Ufez Jones — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 13:15:49 -0800

Sweet. Thanks, Matt. This'll probably bring up a new batch of MeFi gatherings too.

By: konolia

konolia — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 13:16:23 -0800

I have NO ONE.

I could have sworn I used antiperspirant.

By: Kafkaesque

Kafkaesque — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 13:22:51 -0800

My god.

Someone's been posting from my bathroom all this time. Don't panic, kaf, don't panic. Stay alert.

If I can just get to the phone to warn th--

By: quonsar

quonsar — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 13:24:21 -0800

"no zip found in the db"
even though it's right there in plain sight.
perhaps it is referring to the geourl db, in which case i have to say it's horribly out of date.

By: Su

Su — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 13:26:15 -0800

Interesting. Now I know who's within practical stalking distance.

BTW, it's repeating the "X users near this user" heading between each item.

By: timeistight

timeistight — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 13:28:41 -0800

Any way for Canadians to play?

By: Mid

Mid — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 13:29:44 -0800

*hides from Su in 60618*

By: me3dia

me3dia — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 13:30:47 -0800

Kick ass!

By: mr_crash_davis

mr_crash_davis — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 13:33:03 -0800

That's off the bottom of your user page, Matt. Just fyi.

By: me3dia

me3dia — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 13:34:07 -0800

D'oh! Spoke too soon -- got the same error as crash, and I know Su and mid are close enough to me to register.

By: mathowie

mathowie — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 13:34:22 -0800

quonsar, yeah, the zip data is out of date, from the 1990 census.

I could drop the zipcodes altogether and begin asking people to leave their longitude/latitude instead, which would open the whole thing up to the world.

Anyone got any quick long/lat lookup finders that'd help people put that stuff in?

By: thirteen

thirteen — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 13:38:25 -0800

Lotsa Chicago in the MetaTalk today. 60618 over all!

By: timeistight

timeistight — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 13:39:55 -0800

Here's geourl's longitude/latitude resources list: http://www.geourl.com/resources.html

By: padraigin

padraigin — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 13:45:36 -0800

Matt, we're grilling steaks tonight. You coming?

By: SweetJesus

SweetJesus — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 13:47:58 -0800

Lots of people in Providence, and a few in Pawtucket. And of course if you slide though Pawtucket, you best be careful.[Real Audio, naughty language, and probably not that funny for those who don't live near Pawtucket]

By: th3ph17

th3ph17 — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 14:17:04 -0800

well i'm 2 clicks away from you Matt. Anyone for a game of 6 clicks of seperation?

By: PrinceValium

PrinceValium — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 14:17:32 -0800

Perhaps we can cross reference zip codes to our Segmented Marketing Lifestyle Cluster. My Metafilter comments would look a whole lot better if everyone knew they were being posted by a "Young Literati."

By: andrew cooke

andrew cooke — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 14:33:51 -0800

konolia - you can up the distance by changing the dist param in the url. i have it set to a 1000 miles and that gets me 12 neighbours :o)

By: modofo

modofo — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 14:37:36 -0800

MultiMap will convert Canadian (and US) postal codes to lat/long.

By: andrew cooke

andrew cooke — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 14:39:26 -0800

oops, and i was talking about the "usual" geourl interface, not what matt's doing with zip codes.

By: eyeballkid

eyeballkid — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 14:40:57 -0800

*washes hands in kafkaesque's sink, leaves a zodiac sign on the door, steps over k's body, steps through front door*

By: thatweirdguy2

thatweirdguy2 — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 14:47:03 -0800

"There are no other MetaFilter members nearby, sorry."

*wonders if this is a good thing*

By: yerfatma

yerfatma — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 14:50:53 -0800

SweetJesus, please spell it properly so I can stop cringing every time I hear about a Sox callup or rehab stint: P'tucket.

By: yerfatma

yerfatma — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 14:56:12 -0800

Talk about a pony I don't want. Thanks for letting me know Gandolf here lives near me.

By: konolia

konolia — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 15:12:08 -0800

Andrew, I do well to know how to post a link. And I learned that here at Mefi!

It would be easier just to ask if anyone lived in North Carolina.

If not, I want a pony. Or I'll cry.

By: feelinglistless

feelinglistless — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 15:30:22 -0800

I live in Liverpool. UK. I suspect none of you are in my vacinity.

By: zarah

zarah — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 15:34:29 -0800

well that's a boring feature since it's only useful to americans.

By: NGnerd

NGnerd — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 15:38:45 -0800

This and the music are very cool new features Matt, though it does beg the question of what's next for "the community"...
barbeques,
personals,
egging someone's house instead of flame wars.

By: sgt.serenity

sgt.serenity — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 15:39:44 -0800

i like geourls too !!

boom ! boom !

By: padraigin

padraigin — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 15:53:14 -0800

egging someone's house instead of flame wars.

If you try and egg my house, the drug dealers on the corner will shoot you.

Anyone familiar with the location of my ZIP will surely know that's right.

By: Stynxno

Stynxno — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 15:56:01 -0800

I'm all alone...

so very alone...

By: Inkslinger

Inkslinger — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 15:58:45 -0800

Very nice feature, Matt. Thanks. Though geographic location usually matters little on the Net (one of my best online friends lives half a world away), it's nice to see who's local.

By: Lynsey

Lynsey — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 16:10:36 -0800

Matt - my zip code is on my page (94929) but I don't see my name in your list - too far away?

By: Ljubljana

Ljubljana — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 16:10:57 -0800

I am ~~alone~~. I am utterly alone.

As someone outside the CONUS, I'd love to see the system switched to latitude and longitude, although how would we write it? Does anyone know how to make the degrees symbol? Or would it be better to leave it out and write it more plainly?

By: dgaicun

dgaicun — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 16:11:28 -0800

Congrats Matt. How does it feel to know you're within such intimate geographical proximity to such exuberant nature lovers as fishfucker and donkeysuck?

Perhaps, like how they make the sausage I eat, some things are better left unknown.

By: mathowie

mathowie — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 16:27:16 -0800

Lynsey, it's probably too far, but the zip isn't in the zip lookup db.

I'll add longitude/latitude locators to user profiles soon, then people won't have to worry about these zip problems, or it being US-centric.

By: dash_slot-

dash_slot- — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 16:35:39 -0800

ox1 4rn

That's in old money, f'naar f'naar.

By: timeistight

timeistight — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 17:08:22 -0800

Yay!! Thanks, Matt!

By: languagehat

languagehat — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 17:20:58 -0800

115 MetaFilter users near this user

Actually, that's 116, because I happen to know Vidiot lives in the nabe although he's not on the list. So all I have to say to you all is: Step back and let the passengers off first—and don't hold the doors!

By: riffola

riffola — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 17:24:55 -0800

Matt, could you please increase the line height for the list? The descenders of the letters are being cut off.

By: rhapsodie

rhapsodie — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 17:30:22 -0800

25 miles? No wonder I'm not near anybody... in Alaska, you have to drive at least 100 miles to get to the next town big enough to be called a city. For someone to be on my list, they would have to be in my very own city.

'Tis cool, nonetheless.

By: eddydamascene

eddydamascene — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 17:34:25 -0800

Does anyone know how to make the degrees symbol? Or would it be better to leave it out and write it more plainly?

Much easier just to use decimal format. Maporama gives you the result in both forms.
Rounding to the nearest tenth of a degree puts you somewhere within a 6km radius.

By: eddydamascene

eddydamascene — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 17:35:30 -0800

urr.. square.

By: Recockulous

Recockulous — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 18:17:30 -0800

Cleveland is too small for 15 mefiers.

By: riffola

riffola — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 18:29:47 -0800

Cleveland is too small for 15 mefiers.
Ok, please send boomchicka to NYC. She'll fit right in here.

By: tss

tss — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 19:11:54 -0800

Love the feature. Wish there were a way to expand the radius beyond 25mi...

Unfortunately, it doesn't look so hot in "lite" (white background) mode--it's gray and light blue on Cerulean. It's hard to read.

By: G_Ask

G_Ask — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 19:20:17 -0800

Anyone familiar with the location of my ZIP will surely know that's right.
posted by padraigin at 3:53 PM PST on April 30

Curious, I googled your zip.
padraigin's 94303 vs. mathowie's 94070

By: Mars Saxman

Mars Saxman — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 19:24:08 -0800

This is cute. There's something wrong with the style, though; all the lines are scrunched together. (Mozilla, Mac OS 9.2)

By: padraigin

padraigin — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 19:31:04 -0800

Curious, I googled your zip.

Bwa!

and NSFW, for anyone who's not looking at that URL before clicking the link.

By: answergrape

answergrape — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 20:17:10 -0800

Just me here in Albuquerque's North Valley. Nobody else lives here, but maybe you could all come over. We've been meaning to have that feaky tiki party... anybody know how to limbo?

By: five fresh fish

five fresh fish — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 20:22:29 -0800

I could end up motocycling down Albuquerque way one of these days.

Actually, I'd love to do a photo/blog tour, and crash with netfolk on the way. It'd be great fun.

By: answergrape

answergrape — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 20:30:30 -0800

Burque is biker heaven, but if you can come here with a teeny little bike or a crotch rocket you're liable to be blown off the road. They take bikes seriously here.

By: padraigin

padraigin — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 20:38:07 -0800

We plan to retire to Apple Turkey. See you in a couple years, market willing!

By: j.edwards

j.edwards — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 20:44:25 -0800

This is awesome. Lat/Long would make it even sweeter.
My website's GeoURL page

By: madamjujujive

madamjujujive — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 21:03:04 -0800

Very cool, Matt, thanks! How else would I know that I live just a hop skip and a jump from someone named vomitola!

Be consoled, all you global people - use this feature as a roadmap for where & who to crash with on your next visit to the *bush* country.

answergrape, I'll visit - I love NM. I will just hop in my car and be there in a few days, k?

By: boomchicka

boomchicka — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 21:11:39 -0800

please send boomchicka to NYC

Hee! I'd gladly transfer to the New York branch. Although I must say, feel a certain responsibility to the heartland. Those cows don't milk themselves, you know! :)

Great feature, anyway; thanks Matt. It's fun to see who's nearby.

By: answergrape

answergrape — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 21:14:23 -0800

Lat/Long rocks. There's still few bloggers nearby. My GeoURL page. I did learn from my new blogging neighbor Nathan Alter, that there are millions of Atari cartridges buried nearby in Alamagordo. Sadly, most of them are "ET" cartridges. Who knew?

By: answergrape

answergrape — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 21:19:03 -0800

It's a great road trip to Albuquerque. Drive to Chicago, get on the mother road Route 66 and drive for a really long time. Don't forget to stop anywhere in Texas/Oklahoma for bargeque. Oh, and if you really can't make it all the way, stop in Tucumcari and stay at the historic Blue Swallow.

By: mathowie

mathowie — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 21:27:18 -0800

I'll add lat/long later this week.

By: dg

dg — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 21:28:57 -0800

Lat/Long would be great as, sadly, my area code is not and never will be in the database. I am at Lat -26 56 Long 153 19

By: MiguelCardoso

MiguelCardoso — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 21:59:58 -0800

I'll add lat/long later this week.

Heh. Poor Matt confronts the celebrated Greenwich Mean Time/European clusterfuck once again!

If I knew who had invented the expression US-centric I'd kiss that person full on the lips.

By: j.edwards

j.edwards — Wed, 30 Apr 2003 22:35:47 -0800

Sadly, most of them are "ET" cartridges. Who knew?

This is such a great story. I don't own an atari, but I own an E.T. cartridge because of this. (for those of you not in the know, the game sold so poorly that tens of thousands of copies were buried in a landfill).

By: RJ Reynolds

RJ Reynolds — Thu, 01 May 2003 00:10:00 -0800

Matt, can you do something about getting the New Jersey people off my fine Manhattan zip code? *Shudder*

No offense to the lovely Jerseyite Ms Vader (whose CD is finally shipping tomorrow, I swear!).

By: zerofoks

zerofoks — Thu, 01 May 2003 04:13:00 -0800

Does this also work for non-americans?

By: jpburns

jpburns — Thu, 01 May 2003 04:28:59 -0800

Just think!

I can go hang with Stan Chin.

Or not...

By: walrus

walrus — Thu, 01 May 2003 05:26:59 -0800

Does this also work for non-americans?

Not the mefi part (you don't have a US "zip" code), but geourl works fine, as long as you can determine your lat and long.

By: walrus

walrus — Thu, 01 May 2003 05:30:11 -0800

Why do the ideas always come at the moment just after I have pressed the post button?

Matt, would it be possible to have lat/long fields as well as zip fields in the user page, for all of us furriners? Or is that just too much work?

By: amberglow

amberglow — Thu, 01 May 2003 06:08:40 -0800

Matt, can you do something about getting the New Jersey people off my fine Manhattan zip code? *Shudder*

I know!! What's with mixing all those bridge and tunnel people with us?!? ; >

(but it is fun to see "119 MetaFilter users near this user" --although it was only 117 yesterday)

By: jennyb

jennyb — Thu, 01 May 2003 06:18:07 -0800

Hmm... only three people. And one of them (corpse) literally was in my bathroom this morning. I know there are more people from the Triad on MeFi (though thankfully not in our bathroom) so come on, Greensborians. Put in those zip codes!

By: adampsyche

adampsyche — Thu, 01 May 2003 06:23:29 -0800

07091 in the hizzouse.

Matt, can you do something about getting the New Jersey people off my fine Manhattan zip code? *Shudder*

Hey! Don't be pissed that our hockey team made the playoffs and yours didn't!

By: jonmc

jonmc — Thu, 01 May 2003 06:44:42 -0800

And one of them (corpse) literally was in my bathroom this morning

There was a corpse in your bathroom this morning? Time to clean, young lady.

By: quonsar

quonsar — Thu, 01 May 2003 07:36:36 -0800

i changed to my 'parent' zipcode (the current, actual zip wasn't split off from the parent until recently and isn't in the geourl database) and so far, none of my 7 neighbors wants to own up to it. :-)

By: quonsar

quonsar — Thu, 01 May 2003 07:37:41 -0800

i've noted an extrordinary number of moving vans on the road this morning...

By: soyjoy

soyjoy — Thu, 01 May 2003 10:14:26 -0800

Matt, is the database updating continually - i.e. if we go to customize and add it now, will we get results, or only those who already had their zip entered when you put this together? Or should I just shut up and wait for the Long/Lat version?

By: inpHilltr8r

inpHilltr8r — Thu, 01 May 2003 10:45:18 -0800

I'm suprised by the low number of fake 90210's.

By: quonsar

quonsar — Thu, 01 May 2003 10:52:02 -0800

soyjoy, put in your zip, reload your user page and you should see results!

By: soyjoy

soyjoy — Thu, 01 May 2003 13:17:19 -0800

Thanks, quonsar. You da MAN!

*(whew! quonsar is nowhere on that list!)*

By: fishfucker

fishfucker — Thu, 01 May 2003 13:49:48 -0800

updated my zip code too, so quick, check your user pages.

maybe you too are lucky enough to live by me.

and attend my upcoming drinking-in-dolores-park party. email me if you're interested.

By: sgt.serenity

sgt.serenity — Thu, 01 May 2003 14:02:01 -0800

all the nice geourls love a sailor...

By: answergrape

answergrape — Thu, 01 May 2003 15:26:11 -0800

Good news for answergrape: there are TWO mefites near me.

Bad news for answergrape: they're either lurkers or dead.

Teo
Nick Tamm

By: Hildago

Hildago — Thu, 01 May 2003 17:54:14 -0800

Apparently my zip is too new to be listed. There is another zip code two blocks away that probably is old enough though. Oh, cruel fate!

By: salmacis

salmacis — Fri, 02 May 2003 02:45:42 -0800

I'd love to see a Long/Lat field added.

Lon -1.21073 Lat 51.7289

By: norm

norm — Fri, 02 May 2003 08:01:57 -0800

Wow, a good solid number of Twin Cities Mefites in the hiz-ouse. Very neat feature, even if it did spark a bunch of pony-wanting.

Now, if you can just add a feature to do my taxes. I'll wait until next year, I swear.

By: jessamyn

jessamyn — Fri, 02 May 2003 10:58:09 -0800

the MeFiers "near" me are in the next state. I love New England.

By: melissa

melissa — Sat, 03 May 2003 16:52:58 -0800

I'm glad that lattitude and longitude are being talked about for the world. It's neat to see who lives near who. (and has great potential for "hey can I stay with you" when mefi-ers are travelling)

In Canada, postal codes can cover a very limited amount of places. (e.g., my postal codes for both work and home cover only the individual buildings I'm in). This seems to happen in cities more (duh - more people) since when I entered my hometown's postal code, it covered much more territory. (Here's the link to test that theory. I'm not giving you my postal code to test it!) So, I wouldn't feel comfortable adding my postal code if the option was available since it could lead to trouble very quickly.

Obviously, US zip codes work a little differently (although I imagine zip codes cover small territories when they are highly populated as well), since some users have lots of neighbours.

By: oissubke

oissubke — Mon, 05 May 2003 10:17:30 -0800

All mine are lurkers or have jumped ship. Sucks.

By: silusGROK

silusGROK — Tue, 06 May 2003 09:25:23 -0800

This is great Matt! ...can't wait for the LAT/LONG to be implemented!

: )

By: hit-or-miss

hit-or-miss — Tue, 06 May 2003 22:02:27 -0800

17,000+ websites would probably be a lot to traverse, but MeFi could automatically pull up the long/lat for users who have GeoURL metatags on the websites listed in their profiles.

By: Songdog

Songdog — Wed, 07 May 2003 11:55:52 -0800

RJ Reynolds and amberglow, what gives? Northern NJ is the sixth borough.

Is there any way to look near a particular zip code (or lat/long)? I want to see who's near other places without changing my registered zip code over and over.

07042, out.

By: Samizdata

Samizdata — Tue, 13 May 2003 15:45:02 -0800

Nope. No one in my area (62522). To quote the old song:
"Nobody loves me,
Everybody hates me,
Guess I'll go eat worms."

By: t r a c y

t r a c y — Tue, 13 May 2003 16:11:17 -0800

*impatiently waits for matt to add long/lat so the rest of us can play*

By: metrocake

metrocake — Sun, 18 May 2003 15:58:20 -0800

So weird -- you mean to tell me no one else from Long Island's fessing up?! :D